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Kathi L. Heffner

Research Area:
Experimental Health

Specializations:
Social psychophysiological links between stress, emotion and health

Contact Information:

Office: 211 Porter Hall

Phone: (740) 593-0136

E-mail: heffner@ohio.edu

Laboratories:

1. Social/Health Psychophysiology

2. Health Psychology Biological Specimen

Research Interests:

Overview

I am interested broadly in the roles of psychosocial stress and emotion in endocrine, immune and cardiovascular function, physiological concomitants of social psychological phenomena, and how relationships among these factors influence health My current focus is on (a) biopsychosocial processes linking emotional expression about stress and health outcomes, and (b) the social stress of impression management and its physiological concomitants.

Communication of Emotion, Physiological Responses to Stress, and Health Outcomes

My work in this area has developed from substantial behavioral medicine and social psychological research demonstrating associations among verbal and written emotional expression and positive health outcomes. I am particularly interested in the influence of emotional communication about stressful events on subsequent interpersonal processes and physiological responses to stress, and how these responses can influence long-term health indicators and disease-specific health outcomes, such as those associated with cancer. In addition to examining these mechanisms in younger adults, much of my work emphasizes emotional expression and health links in older adulthood.

Impression Management and Physiological Responses

I am interested in the physiological concomitants of stressful impression management situations, such as when an individual expects her or his “self” to be evaluated by peers. Using physiological patterns indicative of coping orientations, I am able to examine how opportunities for, or constraints upon, impression management are experienced. These physiological patterns also provide a window into social mechanisms that may bear on health. I am currently addressing these social psychophysiological processes in romantic partners to examine the interdependent nature of self-presentation in close relationships.

Recent Publications:

	Heffner, K. L., Kiecolt-Glaser, J. K., Loving, T.J., Glaser, R., & Malarkey, W. B. (in press) Spousal support satisfaction as a modifier of physiological responses to marital conflict in younger and older couples. Journal of Behavioral Medicine.
	Heffner, K. L., Loving, T. J., Robles, T., & Kiecolt-Glaser, J. K. (2003). Examining psychosocial factors related to cancer incidence and progression: In search of the silver lining. Brain, Behavior, and Immunity, 17(Supplement 4), S109-S111.
	Kiecolt-Glaser, J. K., Robles, T. R., Heffner, K. L., Loving, T. J. & Glaser, R. (2002). Psycho-oncology and cancer: Psychoneuroimmunology and cancer. Annals of Oncology, 13, 165-169.
	Heffner, K. L., Ginsburg, G. P., & Hartley, T. R. (2002). Appraisals and impression management opportunities: Person and situation influences on cardiovascular reactivity. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 4(2), 165-175.
	Hartley, T. R., Ginsburg, G. P., & Heffner, K. L. (1999). Self-presentation and cardiovascular reactivity. International Journal of Psychophysiology,32(1), 77-85.

Recent Presentations:

Devereux, P., Heffner, K., Gosser, B., Weigel, D., Bullock, C., & LaMarca, P. (November 2003).

Receipt of emotional social support in older adults, people with paralysis, and parenting and nonparenting adolescents.
Presented at the 56th Annual Meeting of the Gerontological Society of America, San Diego, CA.

Heffner, K. L., Loving, T. J., Kiecolt-Glaser, J. K., Glaser, R., & Malarkey, W. (2002).

Neuroendocrine effects of couples’ actual and perceived conflict communication patterns.
Symposium presented at the 11th International Conference on Personal Relationships, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.

Heffner, K. L., Kiecolt-Glaser, J. K., Loving, T. J., Glaser, R., & Malarkey W. (2002).

Social support satisfaction relates to husbands’ and wives’ cortisol and interferon production.
Presented at the 9th Annual Meeting of the Psychoneuroimmunology Research Society, Madison, WI.

Heffner, K. L., Devereux, P. G., Ginsburg, G. P., Nunez, B., & Lim, D. (2002).

Written disclosure and health outcomes in older adults.
Presented at the 3rd Annual Meeting of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Savannah, GA.

Heffner, K. L., Ginsburg, G. P., Davis, M., & Hambrick, S. (2001).

Influences of impression management opportunities and gender on cardiovascular reactivity.
Presented at the 2nd Annual Meeting of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, San Antonio, TX.

Heffner, K. L. & Ginsburg, G. P. (2000).

The stress of rejection: Cardiovascular reactivity to accounts for moral transgressions.
Presented at the 1st Annual Meetings of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Nashville, TN.

Recent Grants:

• (2001-2003) Writing and Health in Older Adults, National Institute on Aging, grant number: 1R03AG019908-01, $50,000. Co-Principle Investigator with Paul Devereux at the University of Nevada, Reno.

Courses Taught:

Undergraduate:
Health Psychology

Graduate:
Psychoneuroimmunology

Affiliations:

• Society for Personality and Social Psychology
• American Psychosomatic Society
• Society for Psychophysiological Research
• Psychoneuroimmunology Research Society
• American Psychological Association